Miss bimbo like games3/19/2023 There was also the below-the-line creative talent of people like William Travilla, who gorgeously styled the costumes - think of Marilyn’s shimmering orange gown beside Jane Russell’s black sequinned number as the pair walk in and drop the jaws of the entire dining room. It was more than a magical selection of stars, writers, and directors that made Gentlemen Prefer Blondes such a delight. But equally tongue-in-cheek and grin-inducing is the proto– Magic Mike number “Ain’t There Anyone Here For Love,” where Jane Russell appraises the men’s Olympic team gym with a sleekly raised brow at all the shirtless beefcakes on show. They are a masterclass: Of course, there’s the swirling fuchsia pink against the liminal red of “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend,” endlessly paid homage to and parodied by everyone from Madonna to Miss Piggy. It is, after all, Dorothy who saves Lorelei by comically impersonating her in a courtroom, blonde wig, breathy voice, and all.Īnd if the director, Howard Hawks - he of stone-cold, classic studio-era romantic comedies like Bringing Up Baby and His Girl Friday - had a wonderful ear for comic dialogue and rapid-fire wit, it was his choreographer, Jack Cole, who took on the mantle of directing the musical numbers. It is one of the few romantic comedies of its era more interested in female friendship than romance, even ending as it does with the classic Hollywood wedding. There’s verve and wit to their bouncing walks, their sideways exchanged looks, their lipsticked mouths curling into satisfied little grins at the reactions they elicit from silly men. Monroe and Russell’s performances - their comedic timing, their sexy knowingness, and their winking burlesque of femininity - are at the very core of Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. Malone and Dorothy begin to fall in love, while Lorelei soon becomes distracted by the elderly owner of a diamond mine. Unbeknownst to them, the wealthy and hapless man Lorelei plans to marry has had his family hire a private eye (Elliot Reed as Ernie Malone) to keep watch over them on the trip. Dorothy (played by the sassy, cynical Jane Russell in the film) is more interested in the handsome ones, while Lorelei likes ’em old and rich. ![]() ![]() The story is of two brassy, beautiful showgirls, Lorelei and Dorothy, who take a cruise liner to Europe in search of men. Loos was a part of a generation of Jazz Age writers with a more progressive attitude toward womanhood, and it’s telling how modern the forward-thinking material still manages to seem in the film. The Hawks film was an adaptation of Anita Loos’s sensational novel from 1925, where the character of Lorelei Lee is a savant who can’t spell to save her life - the stereotypical “dumb blonde” showgirl - but her internal monologue, as written by Loos, sharply lampoons men’s desire to control women, censorship, and the sexual pieties of the powers that be. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes was both a critical and commercial hit, with one reviewer commenting that Marilyn was so luminous that she could practically glow in the dark. In Howard Hawks’s sparkling, joyously witty musical romantic comedy from 1953, Monroe distinguished herself as not merely a blonde bombshell with a lot of studio publicity buildup but as a dynamite comedienne about to be catapulted to superstardom. If I had to choose a favorite line from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes - a high distinction in a film full of quips - it would have to be “I can be smart when it’s important, but most men don’t like it.” It comes from the pouty mouth of Marilyn Monroe’s righteous gold-digging dame Lorelei Lee, and I think it’s the one that most easily could have come out of the actress as well. Photo: FilmPublicityArchive/United Archives via Getty Images
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